“Now that you’re here,” Eva said to Zoe, “he’ll want to melt the ice to get a closer look.”
“Is that wise?”
“As far as I can tell, its blood isn’t circulating. Ergo, it’s dead. But between you, me, Catherine, Juliana, and maybe Carlos and Erich, we should be able to kill it again if needed. With the shackles, I doubt it will be able to escape anyway.”
Zoe placed her hand on the hilt of her dagger and nodded.
“Don’t worry,” Eva said, “Shalise took out two on her own, and I took out one with only having my foot bit off.”
“That isn’t reassuring.”
Eva flashed a grin as she pushed open the classroom door.
It was mostly as she had left it. Catherine sat at her desk, growling at the computer set up on top. Carlos was mid-stride around the back of the ice. Erich sat in the seat nearest the door.
Eva did not miss Zoe and Erich sharing a moment of narrowed eyes with one another.
The professor turned away without a word of greeting, focusing on Carlos. Again, she started out with a few simple greetings and polite questions that Eva only paid tangential attention to.
Her thoughts lingered on the interaction between Erich and Zoe. They clearly knew each other. Not surprising as Zoe had known Genoa before Juliana started school. But apparently no one liked him. The tensions between him and Carlos, Juliana finding his presence to be overbearing, and Zoe’s glare. It made Eva wonder just what Genoa thought of him.
“Alright,” Eva said as the greetings died off. She clapped her hands together, igniting them at the same time. “Shall we melt this enigma down?”
Zoe stepped between Eva and the block of ice, drawing her dagger as she moved. “Why don’t we not use fire. It will make a mess and potentially damage the subject further. I may not be the greatest at hydroturgy, but even I can get rid of the ice.”
Eva huffed. “Fine.” Extinguishing her hands, she folded her arms and watched.
It was interesting. And somewhat alarming.
Not the disappearing of the ice and water. Eva’s classmates had done similar things often enough that it wasn’t interesting in the slightest.
As the enigma’s temperature increased, its blood started moving again. Slowly at first. But enough to put Eva on guard.
She reignited her hands.
That caused half the room to jump to attention.
“Blood is circulating,” Eva said. “I think.”
“You think? How could you
Eva blinked at the odd word from Catherine, but shook her head. “I mean, the blood is moving through its veins, but its heart isn’t beating? Oh, wait. There it goes.”
“I’ll stop,” Zoe said.
Eva waved her off before she could start repairing the ice. She walked up to the front desk and found a yard ruler. Using it, she reached across the shackles and lifted one of the enigma’s freed tentacles.
It flopped back down without a hint of resistance.
Eva took a moment to prod it in various spots, including right in its mouth and eyes. It failed to react in any way.
“Brain dead?”
“Could be,” Carlos said as he rubbed his chin. “If it was in an improper state of suspended animation. Could be something else unique to the creature.”
“Maybe its brain just hasn’t restarted yet?”
“Leave it half in the ice and keep an eye on it.”
And so they did. By the time a full hour had passed, the enigma had restarted almost fully. It was breathing and circulating blood. And showed no sign of slowing down.
Through some equipment in his backpack, Carlos confirmed that its cells were alive in every sense of the word.
The real oddity was that he couldn’t find a single dead cell on the creature. Even if the creature as a whole could cling to life, individual cells should die. Especially when removed from the body.
Disturbance in the Women’s Ward
Eva rolled a bloodstone between her fingers. Aside from the bloodstone embedded in the hilt of her dagger, this was her last bloodstone. And it was one of the good ones, too. The ones from the museum that had a drastically longer shelf life than they should.
As such, despite having the ritual circle set out and all the reagents collected, Eva was loath to actually put it to use.
According to the ritual tome, what she currently had set out should give her a one-way connection to the target, allowing her to perceive the target from any distance. It was a little vague on the exact definition of ‘perceive,’ but Eva was hoping that it would function in a manner similar to her blood sight.
Using the blood reclaimed from Sawyer’s fingers, Eva would be able to see and hunt him down.
But was it really worth one of her unique bloodstones?
